State unemployment continues downward
BUSINESS. New Jersey's unemployment rate continued to fall for the fifth consecutive month.
| 27 Sep 2019 | 01:57
New Jersey’s unemployment rate continued its downward trend in August, moving lower for the fifth consecutive month, while employment levels in the Garden State were essentially unchanged, according to estimates produced by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The state’s unemployment rate edged lower by 0.1 of a percentage point to 3.2 percent – the lowest monthly rate since state-level records began in 1976 – and remained below the national unemployment rate of 3.7 percent. Total nonfarm wage and salary employment in the state increased by 1,100 to reach a seasonally adjusted level of 4,200,400.
Looking at the longer term, over the year, August 2018j until August 2019, employment in New Jersey was higher by 46,700 jobs, with gains recorded in both the private (+44,000) and public (+2,700) sectors of the New Jersey economy. Since February 2010 (the low point of the last recession), New Jersey’s private sector employers have added 404,400 jobs.